In this MOC, a family gathers to celebrate the day with the pounding of mochi (rice cakes) in the traditional style - hammering it inside a large stone bowl. For those who have never seen this before, one person wets their hands and reaches into the bowl between hammer blows to fold the mochi over - timing is crucial! Everyone else helps to roll the mochi into smaller pieces.

A hina-ningyo doll is on display inside the house, along with something else... Don’t forget to enjoy the cherry blossoms!

This is just fantastic. I love the tree, I love the roof, I love it all! It's all so realistic, in a built from plastic covered in little nobby things slice of life the building would fall over otherwise sort of way.

I'd say you awe-struck me, but then I'd have to press charges.

--Anthony

Give a man a fire and he'll be warm for a day.Set a man on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.

From the water bowl, wooden mallet, cherry tree and roof outside to the stove, hina ningyo and "vistor" inside, I can't imagine a more perfect way to recreate this scene. Wow, very nice indeed. And the roof! (I know I already mentioned the roof.) I've never seen roof tiles that look so good in LEGO.

I'm so impressed! I lived in Japan for a time, stationed in Iwakuni, and I find this MOC to be both LEGO accurate and fun. Very nice cherry blossom tree, I can almost smell the blossoms! The roof is splendid. In fact, everything just looks right.

That's not much left to say abouy this MOC... so I'll repeat the others, it's beautiful! Incredibly realistic and simple. The whole scene have a great level of detail, but keeping it 'light'. I would just take one or two minifigs away, but that's just me. Beautiful creation, Sir Nelson!

The details are once again present in this MOC (as others stated). Nice action going on indside, but the things I like the most are the cherry blossoms and the roof... I wonder how you know this about Japanese culture?

As usual, a pleasure to view your stuff!

Knight Templar n. pl. Knights Templars or Knights Templar1.A member of an order of knights founded about 1118 to protect pilgrims in the Holy Land during the Second Crusade.

Being from Hawaii, you can't help but to learn a lot about other cultures.... and that's a good thing!

This was really a fun build for me! Dunechaser knows that I have been wanting to make a mochi-pounding vignette for some time now, but when I tried it on an 8x8 base, I felt it just did not capture the feel of the event. So, it then became 8x16, but I felt it was still missing something - a background. I doubled the base (which is not really a familiar scale for me, other than my 2 CCC3 'room' entries) and then things started to really come together. I am very pleased with the result, especially the roof. You can thank my wife for the idea of the cherry-blossom tree... that made me change the direction of the MOC from a simple mochi-making one to a Girl's Day festival.

As for Urban Commando.... well, after all he is a contemporary ninja! Look for him in some of my upcoming MOCs!

Very cool MOC. Love the unique roof design and cherry blossom tree. A lot of nice little details, like the concrete step and the hanging airconditioner on the side of the house, if that is what it is. One question. Are cherry blossom trees suppose to be black? Or are you using the black to help bring out the pink and white?
Excellent work once again Sir Nelson.